Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Censoring Mark Twain

The Daily Show With Jon StewartMon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Mark Twain Controversy
www.thedailyshow.com
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Heh, heh. I particularly liked Jon Stewart's attempts to get the word out. I know exactly how he feels.

I remember as a kid encountering the blatant racism in some boys books, published around 1910 or so, that my Dad had been given as a child. These were books white Americans were giving to their children back then, and apparently thinking nothing of how black people were portrayed.

Still, there's a reason why Mark Twain didn't use the word "slave" in the first place. As I said elsewhere, if you think it will cause problems among high school students, don't teach Huckleberry Finn in high school. Leave it for college, if you like.

After all, there are far more books - good books, even great books - you could choose to teach than you'd ever have time for. If this is a problem, just select an alternative. That seems simple enough, don't you think?

1 comment:

Chimeradave said...

It's funny they talked about the same two instances of censorship we did.

Thanks for posting this, I was starting to worry that the rest of the country had gone bonkers.

As long as the Daily Show is around there is a glimmer of sanity out there.

John